How to use the Pen Tool

With the Pen Tool you can draw paths with sharp or smooth anchor points as well as add and edit the anchor points on a selected path.

When activated, the Pen Tools toolbar becomes available as well as the Path controls located in the control bar.

Start by selecting the Pen Tool from the toolbar and clicking somewhere on the canvas to add your first point. Then click somewhere else on the canvas to place a 2nd point. Lastly click somewhere away from the first two points to add a 3rd point. Now you should have an open path with three points.

If you are using a keyboard press the esc key to stop the Pen Tool from laying down any additional points to your path.

Clicking on the path between two anchors will add a new anchor point onto the path.

Anchor options

Click on the 2nd point and open up the Path controls panel .

At the top you will notice four Anchor options which are used for adding or removing anchor point handles. The first option will remove handles, and next three options will add handles with either mirrored, asymmetric, or disconnected functionality.

With the 2nd point selected, click on the 2nd option (mirrored) and notice the handles appear on each side of the anchor point. You can use these handles to adjust the curve of the anchor point.

Split the path

With the path selected, toggle on the Cut Tool and tap on any part of the path to separate the path in two pieces.

Joining a path

To join two or more paths together, highlight two or more paths, open the Path controls panel , and select Join Paths.

Selecting multiple points

You can select multiple anchor points by toggling on the Multiple Selection Tool and manually click the points or by highlighting the desired points with the selection box.

Closing the path

An open path is a paths who’s first and last points do not connect, in order to close the path open the Path controls panel , and select Close Path.